Summer reading

 Here are just some of my recommendations

It’s that time of year again. The summer holidays are finally upon us. And that means it’s time for my annual ritual of sharing my summer reading list with you. Here, in no particular order, are some books that I have enjoyed over the last few months — and which you might like as well.

Marble Hall Murders by Anthony Horowitz 

I have been a fan of the Atticus Pund novels and Horowitz’s ability to tell a story within a story without confusing the hell out of his readers. This, the latest in the series, is set in London and the South of France, and revolves around the death of a matriarch written by a disturbed writer who may be cannibalising the story of his own famous family for the plot. Horowitz has made the cosy crime genre his own — and this may be his best effort yet. 

When The Going Was Good by Graydon Carter

I am old enough to remember a time when magazines were where it was at. And at the centre of that world was the foppish figure of Graydon Carter, the now-legendary editor of Vanity Fair. In this memoir, he tells us the stories behind the stories that appeared in VF. And in examining his life, he brings the media world of that period to life as well. 

Karla’s Choice by Nick Harkaway

It’s a brave son who takes on the legacy of a famous father — and manages to do him proud. But that is exactly what John Le Carre’s son, Nick Harkaway, has done in this book that revives the much-loved character of George Smiley. Set in the time period between The Spy Who Came In From The Cold and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, the story revolves around a Soviet spy whose cover is blown after an assassin sent by Moscow tries to kill him. The plotline, the writing, the slow build-up, and of course the comeback of Smiley, all hark back to the glory days of John Le Carre. A true triumph. 

Delizia by John Dickie

Readers of this column will be well aware of my love for all things Italian. But even if you don’t share that love, you will enjoy this book if you are a lover of Italian staples like pasta, pizza and tiramisu. And you will be intrigued to learn that some traditional Italian recipes are not in fact traditional at all, but of relatively recent origin 

Miss Austen by Gill Hornby

I came to this book rather later, and rather shamefully, via a story about the recent dramatisation of the novel on the BBC. Sadly, the TV series has yet to be released in India but until then you can gorge on this gorgeous book. The Miss Austen of the title is not Jane, the novelist, but her elder sister, Cassandra. At the end of her life now, Cassandra is determined to preserve her sister’s legacy by finding all the letters she wrote to a friend and destroying those that portray Jane in a less than flattering flight. The recreation of the Austen universe is a joy to behold and the real-life parallels with Jane’s life are hard to miss. A treat for all Austen fans. 

Summer reading

 What to read over your summer break

 

It’s that time of year again. The heat is on, the holidays are looming, and it’s time to decide what you want to read as you laze on a beach, by the poolside, or up on a mountain. Here are just some suggestions to get you started. 

 

Big Swiss by Jen Beagin

 

What if you meet a stranger in a dog park one day and realize that you know her deepest, darkest secrets? That’s what happens to ‘Greta’ when she bumps into the woman she has christened ‘Big Swiss’ in her mind. Greta, an audio transcriptionist for a sex therapist, introduces herself to Big Swiss and a complicated – and not entirely honest – relationship between the two women develops which will change both their lives

 

Strange Sally Diamond by Liz Nugent

 

Sally Diamond can’t figure out what she did wrong. Her father had told her that when he died she should put him out with the bins. So, that’s what Sally did, incinerating his dead body along with the household waste. So, why is everyone so angry with her, and why have the police been involved. This dark, twisted, and yes, strange story will keep you up all night as it delves into Sally’s past, where nothing is as it seems.

 

Dirty Laundry by Disha Bose

 

Mom murders, suspense in suburbia, domestic drama; they may seem like tired old tropes. But in the hands of Disha Bose, they come alive in her debut novel set in Ireland. Ciara Dunphy is the momfluencer with a picture-perfect curated life, who seems to have it all: a loving husband, amazing children and a beautiful home. But it all comes crashing down when she is found murdered in her home. As Mishti Guha, Ciara’s best friend, and her fellow mom, Lauren Doyle, get dragged into the mystery surrounding her death, the only way to clear their names is to air, you guessed it, the dirty laundry.

 

Romantic Comedy by Curtis Sittenfeld

 

Sally Milz is a sketch writer for a weekly live comedy show (think Saturday Night Live), in her late 30s, divorced, and disillusioned with love. When her colleague, Danny Horst, starts dating a famous and hot actress who is way out of his league, she writes a sketch about how this would never happen with an average looking woman and a hot, famous male star. But then, that week’s show host, Noah Brewster – an ageing pop icon – arrives on set, sparks fly and Sally begins to wonder if she is finally starring in her own romantic comedy.

 

Close to Death by Anthony Horowitz

 

This is the fifth book in the Hawthorne-Horowitz series and unlike the others often lapses into third-person narrative. But that doesn’t impede the flow of the story which begins, as always, with a murder. This victim this time is an unlikeable character called Giles Kenworthy, who ends up dead with a crossbow bolt in his neck. Every single neighbour in Riverview Close – where he recently moved – has a motive to want him dead. And it is up to Horowitz to convince Hawthorne to share the name of the killer with him.

 

Hot favourites

Here’s a list of cracking good reads to get you through the summer

 

Ever since I was a child, I looked forward to summer holidays because they meant I could spend long, uninterrupted days reading all my favourite authors. Even now that I am all grown up and cannot take entire weeks off for the summer, I still stock up on books to read late into the sultry, sticky nights of the hot months. 

 

Just in case you are inclined to do the same, here’s a handy list of the books that have been keeping me entertained of late. I do hope you enjoy them too!

 

A Line To Kill by Anthony Horowitz

 

Setting a murder mystery on an island on which the characters remain trapped is an old trope made most famous by Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None. But Anthony Horowitz breathes fresh life into this format with this book, in which he casts himself as the dim Watson-like figure to the Sherlock figure played by ex-detective inspector Daniel Hawthorne. The two men are invited to a literary festival hosted on the tiny island of Alderney and with a certain inevitability, a body is discovered. Nobody can get on or off the island, and it is up to Hawthorne and Horowitz to unmask the killer. As locked room mysteries go, this one is rather fun.

 

The Love Of My Life by Rosie Walsh

 

What if you wake up one morning and realise that you are married to a stranger? That the woman you love, the mother of your daughter, is not the person you believe she is? Is there any coming back from the discovery? Can any marriage survive such knowledge? This book by Rosie Walsh examines these questions through the love story of Leo and Emma, as they bring up their daughter Ruby and a dog, somewhat improbably named John Keats. Leo, an obituary writer, is assigned to write a stock obit of his wife, as she battles cancer. His research sheds light on secrets that Emma has never shared with him – and their lives begin to unravel from that point on. Nothing is as it seems in this book; and the big reveal – when it comes – will leave you gobsmacked.

 

Anna The Biography by Amy Odell

No journalist has ever had more power in the world of fashion than Anna Wintour, who made her name as editor of Vogue – though she now runs pretty much all of the editorial at the Conde Nast publishing company. Unusually for a fashion journalist, she is now a household name in America and more of a celebrity than many of the people Vogue writes about. She is also as feared as she is admired with tags like Nuclear Wintour being applied to her (the film, The Devil Wears Prada, was famously based on her). This broadly sympathetic biography tries to work out what makes her tick. And though it doesn’t have all the answers it is an enjoyable read as it captures what life can be like for a woman who rises to the top of her profession.

 

The Widow by K.L. Slater

 

Life for Kate and Michael is near idyllic as they bring up their young daughter, Tansy, is a scenic village in the English countryside. But the peace and tranquility they revel in is shattered when a young Polish single mother suddenly goes missing and suspicion begins to fall on Michael. Kate tries hard not to believe the worst of her husband, even as the evidence against him mounts. But when he is killed – run over by a truck as he leaves the police station after an interrogation; begging the question whether it was an accident or a suicide – Kate devotes her attention to safeguarding his memory for her young daughter, no matter what it takes.

 

The Palace Papers by Tina Brown

 

I picked up this book wondering what new information Tina Brown could possibly have about the British royal family, a topic she has already mined for all it has. As it turns out, she has a lot of fresh dirt to dish, from plumbing the depths of Camilla’s mind to examining what made Harry and Meghan bolt across the Atlantic. All of this information is dished up in a chatty, gossipy style that Brown has made her own from her Tatler and Vanity Fair days, making this a cracking good read.

 

End of a chapter

As the year winds to a close, it’s time to update that reading list

The one thing that is as certain as one year bleeding into another, isthat it will be accompanied by a profusion of lists. You know the kind I mean, don’t you? The kind that crop up in every newspaper and magazine, on every news and gossip website, or even on TV entertainment shows, as everyone tries to sum up the year that has gone by in short, sweet listicles.

So, you’ll have Top Ten Business Personalities jostling for space with The Best Hip-Hop Albums of the year. There will be a list of natural calamities fighting for attention alongside one that cites the

political disasters of the year. And so on and on and on.

But for me, this is a time to take stock of what I read over the last one year, which new authors I discovered, which old favourites made a comeback, and which ones made the cut for the list of My Favourite Books of the Year. So, here they are, in no particular order of

importance.

•       Small Great Things by Jodi Picoult: As is always the case with Picoult, this book has at its heart a very human story. A white supremacist couple has a baby at a hospital where African-American nurse, Ruby Jefferson, has worked for 20 hours. They insist that she is not to touch their baby, and the hospital puts that instruction on the file. But when the baby suffers a medical emergency, the only person in the room is Ruby. How she reacts in that moment and the chain of events that follow give us an insight into race relations in America, a ringside view of the legal system, and how lives can turn on an instant.

•       Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz: The author has already paid homage at the shrine of Sherlock Holmes, with A House of Silk. With Magpie Murders, he worships at the altar of Agatha Christie, the queen of the whodunit genre. But the conceit with Magpie Murders is that it comes in the form of a book within a book, with each story as enthralling as the other. There is the bucolic setting, the country-house murder, a slew of suspects and a generous supply of red herrings. In other words, classic Christie territory with just a dash of Horowitz. You can’t go wrong with this one.

•       Frantumaglia by Elena Ferrante: If, like me, you have devoured every word that Ferrante has ever written and are hungry for more, delve deep into this book that compiles all her letters, interviews, emails to give us a deeper perspective into what makes Ferrante the brilliant writer that she is. Best read alongside the books she refers to so that you can actually see how a writer’s mind works its magic on the page. And no, it doesn’t tell you who Elena Ferrante ‘really’ is; because all you need to know is that she ‘is’ Elena Ferrante.

•       Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen: If The Boss’ songs have been the soundtrack to your life, you will love this book, which gives you the backstory and context to so many of his greatest hits. But the bits that resonated the most with me from this excellent autobiography are the parts where Springsteen deals with his depression, his complicated relationship with his father and growing up working class in America.

•       I Let You Go by Clare Mackintosh: The beauty of this book resides in the mother of all plot twists. It opens with a hit-and-run accident that kills a five-year-old child, whose mother let go of his hand for only a second, and everything follows from that tragedy. I am not going to post any spoilers but suffice it to say that when things turn on their head, you will ask yourself how you could have got hoodwinked so completely. Well, that’s because Mackintosh is a master at her game, even though this is only her debut novel.

•       Orphan X by Gregg Hurwitz: If you love the Jack Reacher or the Jason Bourne series, like I do, then you will enjoy this fast-paced thriller. The hero, Orphan X – so called because he was the 24th person to be inducted into The Orphan program (after the 24th letter of the alphabet, X) that turned boys like him into killers for the government – has travelled the world executing people on behalf of his country. But what happens now that the program has been shut down, and he has been cut loose? Well, I’ll leave that for you to find out; but you can be sure that there won’t be many dull moments.

•       Sophie’s World by Jostein Gaarder: This one is a bit of cheat, because I first read it when the first English translation came out in 1994. But I went back to it this year, plucking it out of my

bookshelves on an impulse, and before I knew it, I was down that rabbit-hole again. This is described as a novel about the history of philosophy but it is so much more than that. It is a guided tour through the mysteries of the human mind. And even after all these years, there hasn’t been another book quite like this one. If you still haven’t read it, clear a couple of days on your calendar and dive in.